‘Work In Progress’ is a cross-disciplinary blog focusing on IT & Web Innovation at the University of Exeter

Great Scott!

Tablet and slate devices are going to be the savior of the publishing industry! Does the publishing industry need saving? That’s an interesting question in itself with impassioned arguments on both sides of the fence. Personally I have noticed a trend towards electronic publishing for many years, in fact its hard to miss. The publishing industry is merely the next medium to want to take advantage of electronic stores and distribution.

Yesterday I received an email from a magazine to which I am a subscriber and panel survey member. The latest survey was rather interesting, containing many questions about electronic magazines. They specifically mentioned the existence of an Apple iPad app to replace a subscription for some customers! The business model I suggested was a free iPad application which comes with a few example magazines and the ability to buy new magazines and subscriptions with ‘in app purchases‘

Lets look at the differences between digital and paper based magazines.

The magazine is finished after being designed with Adobe In-Design software

Trees are chopped down and pulped up to make paper

Fish are mashed up to make glue to hold the paper together

The magazine is printed on expensive printing presses using ink and paper

It is glued, cut, finished and stored in a massive warehouse

they are placed on trucks and planes to be distributed around the world

The magazines arrive at stores which take a cut to sell the magazine

They are purchased and read, then get recycled or thrown away

Each business in the chain takes a cut with the original publisher of the magazine taking a surprisingly small amount of money.

Now lets compare that with a fully digital printing model

the magazine is finished after being designed with Adobe In-Design software

the magazine can now include video and new forms of advertising

the magazine is printed to electronic formats such as ePub and PDF in seconds

These are downloaded directly by the customers to their iPad, eBook reader, or laptop

There are no trees to cut down, no ink or glue needed, there is nothing to transport using fossil fuels and there is a direct transaction between the magazine maker and the customer. The magazine is cheaper for the customer, and yet makes more money for the publisher since there are no middlemen to pay and there are enhanced advertising opportunities. There is no waste, no landfill, no recycling needed!

This really could be just like that scene in Back to the Future, where the morning paper and your magazines are delivered straight to your slate in digital form. I don’t really like newspapers as they are too big, awkward to read and fall apart, with much questionable content. However, I could really see myself reading a quality newspaper delivered directly to my preferred reading device in the future. Why not try out an electronic magazine now to see what all the fuss is about?

2 Responses

Unlike Darren I’m very fond of newspapers, for me flicking through the supplements is still my preferred Sunday morning activity (not that I get the chance very often!), but there’s definitely something shifting in the marketplace more generally. Like many people I would say that on average I still tend to read longer and more complex articles on paper, and use digital media for shoter, more bite size content. Whether that’s chicken or egg is debateable – is the digital medium naturally more suited to that type of content, or is it just that most of the content online tends to be short and less complex. Perhaps because the majority of web content tends to be written by less able writers, a product of their inexperience is that the articles are less complex? Writing is after all a skill, and though pretty much all of us can do it, that doesn’t necessarily mean we can all do it well. I write a lot online, but I know I’m not a particularly talented writer – you only have to read the work of someone with the talent to spot the difference, and feel the time slide away as you become wrapped up in their world.

Thinking about a real world example of paper versus digital I’ve been very dissappointed by the new UK Wired magazine that I took out a subscription for recently. I was very exicted about the launch of this, thinking that it would be a rich, thorough and overall deeper exploration of all that was happening in new technologies. Instead I’ve generally found it full of lightweight summaries of existing tech, a fair sprinkling of what seems to me simple nepotism, far too many adverts … and even articles about tooth whitening! Not exactly the kind of tech news I was expecting. It’s a lovely physical object, they’ve put a lot of effort into choices on inks, papers, glues, etc. but the content is a bit lacking in my opinion.

I certainly agree that we’ll see more digital publication, and tools such as the iPad (and other future possibilities – e.g. http://j.mp/97DlL6) will be fundamental to their uptake, but I think the bottom line is the quality of the content itself will remain the key to success. Whether paper or digital, glossy photographs or interactive video, seems to me it’s the quality of the individual piece of content that counts at the end of the day.